The Web of VR Will Change Everything

The World Wide Web (WWW) need no further introduction. The greatest innovation of the Information Age is now essential to the world like no other technology. Before the WWW – computers, programs and information were not linked. The computers were lonely, and users could not browse the millions of interconnected computers the way we do today.

The Web has been changing ever since its dawn in the 90s, and has seen its distinct phases. What we call “Web 1.0”, for instance, was a static web. Websites could be visited and navigated, but they were static in the sense of not affording any user interaction. Web 2.0 opened up for more dynamic web applications that could be altered by user input. These did not just allow download, they could also be uploaded to – a feature that is now an essential underpinning of social media and web-based applications. Companies like Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, etc., do not provide content to be downloaded, but rather a computer service to be used where the users provide the content.

It should be noted that “Web 1.0” and “Web 2.0” are just terms: there are constantly being added changes to the Web. The terms does, however, signify when these changes are inducers of a paradigm shift in the use of the Web. What is to be classified as Web 3.0 is therefore also discussed. Although not necessarily a feature of the Web, the Internet of Things (IoT) is a candidate for what has become a paradigm shift within web technologies, as more and more devices and artifacts are connected, allowing for ubiquitous computing. Others discuss the personalised Web we see today, as it is influenced by social media, while some are joining the AI hype, and claim that the Web has now become smart. The latter is far from a paradigm shift as of yet.

The Virtual WebIn this entry we will discuss WebVR, or Virtual Reality through, and on, the Web. The title of this entry, which claim that “The Web of VR Will Change Everything”, may indicate a stand towards the debate that I have introduced, of what will be the “Web 3.0” – but that is not the point of this entry. I do not wish to make a claim of WebVR as a paradigm shift of the way the Web operates, but it most significantly will be a paradigm shift in how we experience the web technology as it is.

The concept and role of the Web, nevertheless, is the same: we have a dynamic web which features download and upload of web documents. In the case of VR the difference is that what we download and upload, are perceived as realities for us: the web is the mediator of realities, and this new way of using the web changes VR more than VR necessarily changes the Web. What characterizes the Web, is its simplicity, its openness and the innate element of surprise. Anything can be found, and the exploration as such is an important part of it. These features are the same that will be valuable in VR as well: to discover open virtual worlds, created by anyone.

Mozilla’s A-Frame is now ready for Link Traversal through hyperportals

Creating VR for the WebWebVR, a framework for browsers to support Three-Dimensional Stereoscopic Virtual Environments, is already developed and supported by many browsers. As HTML, CSS and JavaScript already have the powers to create and render graphics through frameworks such as WebGL, the web languages have increasing power to support such scenarios. Lately, frameworks combining these different frameworks to make implementation of WebVR even easier. Mozilla’s A-Frame, lets the user set up a Virtual Environment only with less than 20 lines of code (see their Hello WebVR example), using ‘normal’ HTML tags, which they call primitives, to create 3D objects in 3D space. A-Frame utilizes Three.JS to do this, and Three.JS uses the WebGL.

It is now easy to create Virtual Environments on the Web, even arguably easier than creating them through Unity. The great benefit of this is that they can be connected to each other, by a standard hypertext reference, instead of uploading to Steam or Oculus Store, etc. A-Frame introduced hypertext support, which they call “Link Traversal”, in July of 2017, but the browsers are only just catching up. As of now, it is only supported by Firefox and Supermedium on PC, however, as of February 2018 Oculus Browser has supported it on GEAR VR, and most likely also on Oculus Go.

A-Frame’s Diego Marcos called this a great achievement, as A-Frame finally achieved their ‘Web badge’. For this they deserve congratulations, A-Frame has now completed an essential step towards the Web of Realities. In their introductory blogpost, they introduce a “hyperportal” example, which provides you with a preview of the VR world you are about to enter, and which redirects you to the page when you virtually walk through it. This is a piece of very fun code to play around with. A neat feature is that the portal itself is “transparent”, and so provides a preview of the virtual environment to which you are travelling.

The future of WebVRAs with anything within VR, we are still a few years behind its potential. WebVR has had a solid boost the latest few years, but before a Head-Mounted Display is commonplace, we probably wont find a VR search engine or enough websites for exploration to be truly amazing. This is not bad news, however, it means that this is just the right time for creative ideas. We see the inevitable emergence of the VR Web, and can help shape it. For instance, at Matrise, we have previously discussed Virtual Reality Memory Palaces. This would be great to incorporate for sharing on the Web, so each memory palace could be interconnected, creating vast banks of knowledge for memorization.

Do you have any good ideas for any WebVR apps?
Feel free to comment below.

The ancient Greeks created “Memory Palaces” to recall important information.